This present invention relates to identifying pay-per-view programming in a subscriber television system, and more specifically to identifying specific individual programs or channels as pay-per-view programming within a program guide.
Subscriber television systems transmit television signals to system subscribers. Subscriber television systems typically include a headend for receiving satellite signals, demodulating them to baseband signals, combining them with other television programming signals, and transmitting the combined signals via a transmission media to subscriber equipment that tunes to television channels for display to the subscriber. The combined signals can be transmitted to the subscriber over a variety of transmission media such as via satellite, coaxial cables, fiber optic cables, or combinations thereof. Signals to the subscriber can be provided directly to a cable-ready television, a cable-ready video cassette recorder (VCR), or a home communication terminal (HCT) connected to a television or other display device, such as a computer.
Many subscriber television systems can provide hundreds, or even thousands of channels, to subscribers. Often these subscriber television systems provide television program information (e.g., channel line-up, program schedules, etc.) to the subscriber equipment so that the subscriber can view the program information on the television itself. This program information is typically presented in the form of a program guide that displays the program information by time and channel.
The program guide typically displays all of the available channels and services on a subscriber television system. Subscribers can see what is available on all the channels even if they do not subscribe to all of the channels and services available on the subscriber television system.
A simple program guide can automatically scroll through the available television channels to present the program information, such as name and description, at a selected time. An interactive program guide (IPG) allows a subscriber some control over the presentation of program information. The subscriber, depending on the subscriber television system, can scroll up or down through the hundreds of channels and forwards or backwards through several days or weeks of program information. A subscriber often depends on the program guide to provide them with information on the available programming on the subscriber television system.
Pay-Per-View (PPV) programs, such as movies or sporting events, generate additional revenue for the system operators. A subscriber views the program guide for the PPV channel, selects an available PPV program, and communicates a desire to pay for viewing the PPV program to the system operator. These additional purchases provide the system operator with additional revenue beyond the normal monthly subscription charges. Current PPV programming is typically limited to a few channels of PPV-only programming. As the systems and methods of providing PPV services become more sophisticated, additional programs could be available as PPV programming and need to be easy for a subscriber to identify as PPV programming.
Thus, what is needed is a simple and easy method for a subscriber television system operator to select and designate programs as PPV programming and for subscribers to identify such programs as PPV programming.